


Dear Elle

by NanakiBH



Category: Tales of Xillia, Tales of the World: Reve Unitia
Genre: Crossover, Family, Letters, M/M, Reunited and It Feels So Good, World Travel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-14
Updated: 2015-05-14
Packaged: 2018-03-30 14:35:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,012
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3940474
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NanakiBH/pseuds/NanakiBH
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The mailbox of Frères Apartments Room 302 overflows with letters from far away, from places without addresses.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Dear Elle

**Author's Note:**

> Have I mentioned how much I love Reve Unitia...? There are so many things you can do with it. The fact that Mint, Rutee, Stahn, and Cress somehow made it into Xillia's world for _story segments_ makes me think that this would be 100% possible, too... Though I'd really love to know how they went about getting there.
> 
> Edit: If you haven't played/seen Reve Unitia, check the comments for a detailed explanation of that world.

The others all had their own lives to live. Things were totally normal for them before any of Origin's mess happened, so it was difficult for any one of them to volunteer to take care of a little girl. She didn't blame them, understanding that it wasn't a simple decision to make, but it still hurt, reminded her that she was alone now. Ludger was gone. Even Glasses Guy was gone. They were somewhere on the other side of that gate where they met Origin now.

At least, that's what she told herself. The deep ache in her chest hurt a little less as long as she kept believing that they were just somewhere else. She didn't want to think about reincarnation or anything like that. She just wanted Ludger to be Ludger forever. Unlike Milla, though, he was just a regular person, so he was probably never going to come back. He was gone. But gone didn't mean that he stopped existing, did it?

As long as she kept thinking about him, he'd be alive, she thought.

Unsure of what to do, they went to Spirius to give it more consideration. Trigleph seemed like a fine place for her; not far from where her home in the other dimension had been and still close to the apartments where the brothers had lived.

The second she heard what was going on, Nova volunteered to take care of her. Her ready answer shocked Elle, and she was immediately overwhelmed with emotion, elated and relieved that there was someone who would have a genuine desire to be responsible for her. It helped that Nova was someone who had been friends with Ludger.

No one forgot about her. Even if they had their own lives, they still found the time to send her texts and emails that updated her about what they were doing, asking her about how she was doing, too. It was a bit easier for her to focus on the future when she realized how hard they were all working to create the future that they wanted to see. Still, there was a broken part of her that wished that her GHS would buzz and she'd pick it up to find a certain someone's name on the screen. But she knew that would be impossible.

Although she stayed at Nova's, they hadn't let go of the brothers' apartment yet. Nova didn't talk much about them, usually laughing off her thoughts before they all got out of her head, but Elle could tell that there was a lot she wanted to say about them. The three of them had been close. She knew that much. Now that Ludger was gone, Elle found herself grasping for any piece of him that remained, so she wished that Nova would tell her more, share the things that she knew about them that she'd never heard before. It was probably fine if they stayed the same in her memory forever, just the way that she knew them when they'd been alive – when they'd been _there_ – but she couldn't help it. She wanted more.

She wanted more time with them. And the fact that Nova had also been hesitating to let go of their apartment was all that she needed to tell her that Nova wanted more time with them, too.

They went there occasionally. They brought Rollo with them and he'd aimlessly wander around, meowing quietly, scratching at Julius's door like he expected him to come out and feed him. Just seeing him act that way made Elle want to cry. She felt the same. When she opened Ludger's bedroom door, she always hoped that she'd find him sitting on his bed. It was so easy to imagine that it made it harder for her to believe that he was dead.

'Dead' sounded so final. It made her mad when other people said that they were dead. They weren't dead, she'd want to say. They just weren't there anymore.

One time when they visited the apartment, about a year after the brothers left, Nova suddenly burst into tears in the hallway. Elle stopped with Rollo and they went back to where Nova was standing by the mailboxes. Someone must have left something there, but Elle didn't know why Ludger would still be getting mail. At that point, anyone who'd known them must have known that they were gone.

She asked Nova what the letter said, but Nova crumpled it up in her hand and shook her head, telling her that it had to be a prank that someone was playing on them. It was something mean, she said. That's why she was crying.

They didn't talk about it after that, but Elle's curiosity was piqued. If someone left a letter for them, then that probably meant that there was another person out there who knew them. Nova had told her little bits about them here and there, but she'd never told her enough to make her feel satisfied. She was probably never going to be satisfied... But that was all the more reason for her to find out who that letter was from.

So, instead of asking her about it, she waited until Nova was asleep that night and snuck out of her room. She knew that Nova hadn't thrown it away, and she found it tucked in the pocket of the jacket she hung by the door. Quietly removing it from her pocket, Elle took it to her room. On the way there, her footsteps accidentally woke Rollo. He gave her a tired, curious meow and she held a finger to her sealed lips to tell him to stay quiet. Curious, he followed her into her room and the two sat on her bed together as she unfolded the crumpled letter.

The second she saw the first line, her eyes widened.

It wasn't addressed to Ludger or Julius. For some reason, the letter began with her name. She didn't recognize the handwriting, but it was written very clearly, as if penned by someone who knew that she would have trouble reading an adult's scrawl. As her eyes scanned the letter, carelessly skipping from one word to another, unable to focus on any particular thing, she understood why Nova had started crying when she read the letter.

Taking a deep breath, she tried to calm down so she could patiently read the whole thing.

_Dear Elle,_

_Where do I begin this letter? I don't know. Sorry, I've never written a letter like this before. When I was younger, they made us write imaginary letters for practice in school, but practice is a lot different from the real thing. I'm already filling this with nonsense, aren't I? I hope you're able to read it properly. I'll try not to use any really big words._

_I hope it reaches you safely. I can't deliver it myself, but we have some friends who can send letters for us. I don't want to bother them too much with it, but I'd love to send you more in the future._

_I just want you to know that we're doing alright. I probably shouldn't say this, but I miss you. We both do. I hope you're doing okay, too. Keep us in your dreams. That's where you'll find us now._

_Be good._

It was cruel. It was no wonder Nova had cried.

But there were little warped wrinkles at the bottom of the page where a signature would've been, so Elle knew that it wasn't a prank. Whoever wrote this letter wrote it with their full heart and they'd signed it with their tears.

Holding Rollo tightly, she let out the tears that she'd been trying so hard to hold back. They were okay, she told him, pressing her face into his fur. It still hurt, knowing that she couldn't see them, knowing that they were missing her too, but she was so happy just to know that they were okay somewhere like she'd hoped. Nova might've thought that it was just a prank, but Elle wanted to believe.

That night, she fell asleep with Rollo by her side, the letter loosely held in her hands. As she fell asleep, she wondered if there were a world other than her own somewhere beyond her closed eyelids.

In the morning, when she couldn't find the letter in her pocket, Nova asked her if she knew what happened to it. That was her opportunity to pretend that she didn't know where it went, but Elle looked her in the eyes and adamantly told her that she planned to keep it. It was a special letter addressed to her, so it was hers. Although she was silent for a moment, staring at her with some concern in her features, Nova eventually conceded and allowed her to keep it.

After all, Nova hadn't been able to let go of it, either. She wanted to believe just as badly as she did that the letter really came from who they thought.

 

There weren't any more letters for a long time. Every time they visited the apartment, they made a habit of checking the mailbox, just in case. They didn't want to admit it to each other at first, but Nova eventually told her that checking the mail was what she looked forward to most about their visits to the apartment. As an adult, she said, it was stupid for her to place so much hope in something that was probably fake, but that single letter had made her so happy. Even if it were a joke, she kind of wanted to thank whoever had written it because it gave her a certain peace of mind.

Hearing Nova finally talk about the way she really felt made Elle want to cry, but she held it together for her. At those moments when Nova wanted to be like a little kid and show how she felt, Elle wanted to be strong for her. It was what Ludger would've done.

As long as they kept checking the mailbox, expecting to find a letter from them, it felt like the brothers still lived in the apartment, like their presence had never completely left.

 

The next one didn't come for a few months, but when it did, they were shocked to see it sitting in the box. They fished it out and headed up to the apartment room with it. Once they were sitting on the couch together, Rollo in Elle's lap, Nova handed it to her and let her be the first to read it.

_Dear Elle,_

_I was worried that the first letter might have confused you. I hope it didn't make you sad or anything like that. I still hope you were able to receive it, though, otherwise this letter is going to sound like it comes out of nowhere. Sorry. I'm being confusing again._

_Anyway, we've found a place for ourselves now. We've decided to help the people here. Every now and then, we get to meet some old friends from places far away, so it's pretty exciting. I think we might be able to go to some of those places eventually, too. I'll be sure to write you again if we do. Maybe I can send you presents, too. I'm not sure how much I can fit in the mail!_

_By the way, I can send the letters myself now!_

_Keep us in your dreams. I'll do my best to keep your bad dreams away._

There were no wrinkles at the bottom of the page this time, but that was fine because Elle and Nova didn't feel like they needed to cry this time, either. They had no idea what kind of place they were in now, but it sounded like a nice place.

The last line was still mysterious, but Elle started formulating her own ideas about it. Every night when she fell asleep, she imagined Ludger tucking her in. She imagined him kissing her on the forehead and it felt so real sometimes that she had to open her eyes again, half-expecting him to really be there in front of her. It made her heart hurt a little, but she was able to close her eyes, feeling at peace and protected, confident that Ludger was watching over her from somewhere.

During their journey to the Land of Canaan, she had all sorts of nightmares; ones where she reached for her daddy, but...

Ever since she received that second letter, she didn't have any more nightmares. With the tumultuous feelings that fought constantly in her chest almost every day, she thought that she might have at least one or two here and there, but not a single bad dream came.

Wherever he was, Ludger was fighting them away for her.

 

The letters became more regular. In one of them, Ludger admitted that he didn't know whether it was right for him to still be sending them to the apartment. It was the only place he could send them to, he said. Even when he was far away, he was still hoping that he wasn't causing problems for anyone else. That was so like him.

Gradually, they learned more about the world that he and Julius were in. According to them, they weren't breaking any rules because they weren't really dead – not anymore, anyway. Whether that meant that they had already been reincarnated somewhere else or not, Elle wasn't sure, but that wasn't what mattered. She was just glad that the Ludger who continued to send her letters from somewhere far away sounded like the same Ludger she had known in her world.

 

One day, about a year after the letters began, she finally got a present in the mail. The moment she and Nova stepped into the apartment hallway, they found the mailbox overflowing with pink flowers. The landlady was already trying to sweep the petals that had fallen away with a broom, but they made her stop and promised that they would take care of it. Elle took off her backpack and removed the few things that were inside and Nova helped her scoop all the flowers and loose petals into the backpack.

Once they were upstairs, they sat on the couch like always and read the accompanying letter.

_Dear Elle,_

_We did it! We've finally made it to another world! Right now, we're in a place called Halure. The people here refer to it as the 'City of Blossoms'. There's a huge tree in the middle of the city with these incredible pink flowers. I'm sending a few of them to you with this letter. You might want to share some of them with Elize. I think she'd really appreciate how pink they are!_

_Apparently it's thanks to some friends of ours that the tree is still able to bloom at all. Looking at it made me think about you and made me wonder how you're doing now. It's been a year now, hasn't it? You must have grown a little taller. Maybe a lot! Brother said to watch yourself around the boys. He can't be there to scare them away._

_There's a city near here where a friend lives. We're going to go visit him soon. I think we might even get to see the princess. She's really pretty and nice! This whole world is very nice. It's very calm here, but something about it makes me feel homesick. I miss the sound of the city, the smell of the station, the people. I miss you most of all._

_I may not be able to come to you, but as long as you keep striving to be the best Elle you can be, then maybe you can come here someday._

_Remember to keep us in your dreams. You're what gives us strength._

When they finished reading it, they couldn't keep themselves from laughing. It may have ended with a bittersweet sort of feeling, but as soon as they took another look at all the flowers spilling out of Elle's bag, they just couldn't help it. Ludger said that he would send a 'few', but that looked like a lot more than just a few. Elle was definitely going to have enough to share with Elize.

They took a trip to Sharilton where Elize was staying with Driselle and delivered half of the petals to her while they were still fresh. Being an extreme pinkist, Elize was ecstatic when she saw their vibrant color, but her excitement was curbed by a bit of confusion when she realized that she'd never seen such a flower. Nova and Elle just looked at each other. When Nova gave her a slight nod, Elle took the newest letter from her pocket and handed it to Elize. She read it silently and looked like she was going to cry when she finished.

Elize couldn't believe it, but the petals were proof.

She asked them whether it was alright for her to tell the others about the letter, and they agreed that it couldn't hurt. From one of the other letters, they had the impression that Jude and Milla might have already been able to meet Ludger and Julius in their new world. At worst, the others might think they were crazy, but Nova and Elle believed in their penpals from far, far away.

As the petals began to wither, Elle felt desperate to preserve them. She didn't want to see her precious gift from them wither up and get thrown away, so she pressed them in between the pages of her school books to dry them. A few of her classmates asked what they were when some of them floated out from between the pages, but she just smiled and said that they were a gift from her daddy.

 

After that letter, they received more from other worlds. Unexpectedly, they finally received a letter that seemed to have been penned by Julius, its handwriting noticeably different from Ludger's.

_Dear Elle,_

_I hope that this letter finds you doing well. My brother and I are in a place called Flanoir tonight. It's known as the 'Snowy City' and it's not hard to see why. We had to cross through a blizzard to make it here, but it was worth it. The food here is some of the best I've ever eaten. Of course, it isn't quite as good as my brother's, but he's been ordering up a storm because he's so determined to learn about their cooking. Food seems very important in this world._

_Much like your world, the one we used to live in, the land here used to be divided. It's inspiring to see the people working together, forming a more united world. Someday, I hope that all our worlds can become linked._

_Traveling together is nice. I can't tell you how good it feels to finally be with him like this. When all is said and done, we always return to our new world where the people wait for us, but I can tell how much he wishes he could return to where you are. There isn't a day when he isn't thinking about you._

_Keep us in your dreams, Elle. As he protects you in yours, I'll be sure to keep him safe._

That time, instead of flower petals or anything like that, the letter was accompanied by a tin of cat food. If there had been any doubt about which brother the letter had come from, then that erased it.

She and Nova looked at each other, wondering whether it was safe to eat food from another world. Too curious, they found a can opener in the kitchen and opened the tin. The second that Rollo could smell it, he went wild, showing more energy than they even thought he was capable of anymore. They scooped it into his dish for him and he scrambled over to it, sticking his whole face in the dish.

If only Rollo could speak... They wondered what he would've had to say about it, but the voracity with which he ate it seemed like answer enough.

They were going to have to give up the apartment eventually, but Elle didn't want to let go of that mailbox. It was their only link to them now. ...For now. Julius made it sound like there might be a way for their worlds to all come into contact with each other some day. For now, he and Ludger were able to go to other worlds, so it felt like there had to be a way for them to come back to her eventually.

There was something that prevented them from coming back. Maybe it was because they died – at least in this world. They didn't belong here anymore. They didn't have a place here.

If they couldn't come to her, then that was why she was going to have to come to them. It frustrated her endlessly, not knowing how she was supposed to accomplish that. She wished that she could ask Ludger what she was supposed to do, but she had the feeling that he didn't know either. That was why he was working so hard, traveling all over to find a way. Until he found a way, she was just going to have to do what Ludger told her to do.

She had to be the best Elle that she could be.

It was a request from Ludger, so she was going to be sure to honor it. It was a lot easier to move along now that she knew they were alright. It was hard to be sad anymore when she held their expectations.

 

The years passed easily, but her every day was spent looking to the sky, wondering where they were now. There were so many worlds out there, they seemed infinite. It made her happy to know that they could go to a thousand worlds, make a thousand new friends, but that they'd still be thinking about her. Everyone else had moved on with their lives and grown up, and she had too, but a part of her was still stuck in that day when Ludger left. She joined the others on their quests, but she kept dreaming of something bigger; an adventure of her own, one where she could finally be reunited with them.

Clutching the watch in her pocket, with Rollo and his kitten at her side, she kept moving on, following the path worn by their footsteps.

Her adventure never began until she closed her eyes. That moment before she fell asleep was always the most exciting. Whenever she drifted into sleep, she imagined them waiting for her on the other side of sleep, somewhere in her dreams.

 

Within a dream, she opened her eyes, still feeling tired as if she'd been awoken in the middle of the night.

Beside her, she saw two pairs of boots, one dusty tail, and one white-and-black tail. She had no reason to feel nostalgic when she saw them, but her heart suddenly began to pound and she couldn't keep her emotions from showing on her face when she finally looked up. They looked a little different now, but the way they hugged her felt just like how she remembered.

When they pulled apart, she was able to have a better look at them. They looked good like this, she thought, clad in what looked like summoners' robes. There were other people with ears and tails around them, all smiling fondly. This had to be the place they'd gone, the world they called home now.

“It finally worked,” Julius said, smiling.

Ludger wiped the tears from his face and looked at her with a smile that felt like a reward for the effort she made back home.

“You've gotten so big,” he said, and she nodded, smiling through her tears. “A beautiful young lady. The heroine of your own story.” Laughing, rubbing at his face some more, he helped her stand. “Welcome, Awoken One, to the World of Dreams.”


End file.
